Month: April 2018

Fox Searchlight As we were in our seats prior to seeing Isle of Dogs, my companion leaned over as the lights dimmed and said, “here comes the whimsy.” Whimsical certainly is a good word to describe director Wes Anderson’s stylistic and storytelling flavor. His movies are an acquired taste and I myself have had an on-again-off-again relationship. I disliked Rushmore (1998) and Royal Tenenbaums (2001), but I absolutely adored (nee LOVED) Moonrise Kingdom (2012) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Since the former pair of movies were early in his career and the latter have been more recent, I was excited to see Isle of Dogs, Anderson’s latest creative endeavor. Creative is another good word for Anderson. Unique would be another. Isle of Dogs definitely belongs in the love side of my love-hate relationship with Anderson’s movies, and I’m happy to say that even as a cat person.

I actually have never seen Anderson’s first stop-motion animated film, Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), but now that I’ve seen Isle of Dogs, I will definitely seek it out. Stop-motion animation feels like a lost art, in this age of digital everything, but Anderson goes old-school and creates his animated movies the real (and right) way. Stop-motion is a painstakingly detailed and time-consuming process in every way. Over 1,000 puppets were hand-built and over 240 miniature sets were created—every part of the production design and cinematography process is done shot by shot, literally frame by frame. And the result? An absolutely delightful feast for all the senses.